“This is an idea that makes common sense – that you don’t want the people who are being investigated to have this appearance of connection to the people who are investigating. You want the community to trust these investigations. You want them to be independent.”
That’s Roger Rogoff, director of the Washington State Office of Independent Investigations (OII), on legislative intent and trust in the agency’s purpose – and how that leads to the need for experienced investigators balanced with independence.
“How do you do investigations really well if you don’t have people who have done it before? The answer is, well, you need some people who have done it before. So how do you then make sure that the mission stays front of mind? That’s the magic of the agency.”
This week on Inside Olympia, Rogoff updated host Austin Jenkins on recent activity at OII, which was stood up in 2022 but only began investigations last December, and only in one region of the state, southwest Washington. Since December OII has investigated five fatal-force cases, completed two and has three pending. Rogoff said OII will announce its second region within weeks and outline a roadmap for expanding statewide.
Rogoff said staffing is the agency’s biggest challenge as it works on expansion. He says the agency needs 100 investigators to be fully staffed statewide. It now has 31 – and will ask the Legislature to fund another five during the 2026 session. “It’s going to take a commitment from the Legislature to get us that many investigators. It’s also going to take a commitment from us to be creative – to see if we can bring that number down a little bit, which we are always willing to do.”